Regenerative Medicine in Rhinology

Regenerative medicine, using stem cells with or without scaffolds, allows surgeons to treat congenital or acquired defects with normal structure and functions. Although stem cell and regenerative medicine are nowadays used quite often in some areas of medicine, it is obvious that they are in their crawling stage in reconstructive surgery and in rhinology. However, it is not difficult to predict that it will become popular in the next few decades and will be among the treatment regimens in the guidelines. The various developments in isolation, duplication, and differentiation of stem cells and three-dimensional scaffolds suggest that some of the more frequently applied therapies may be shelved in the close future. Stem cells are categorized as embryonic stem cells, induced pluripotent stem cells and adult stem cells. Adult stem cells are generally preferred in practice nowadays due to ease of isolation and differentiation stages. The purpose of this section is to provide information on stem cell applications and regenerative medicine in rhinology at present and in close future.